We all know that Christmas, “The Holidays”, as we now refer to them is for Giving. (Yea… whatever… I call it Christmas, you call it whatever you want.)

As the saying goes… “It’s better to give than to receive.” The act of giving allows you to receive the joy, love, gratitude, excitement, etc. from the person you are giving to. But Giving doesn’t have to be material/physical in nature. (Unless you want to give me a bottle of wine or a million dollars, I’m not going to dissuade you. LOL!)

Sure, you can give someone a gift that is heartfelt, homemade, a memento of past experiences, a symbol of your love… yada yada.

The Evil Retailers …. have turned the Giving Season into an over-crazed spending holiday to get people to buy more and more crap we don’t really need to begin with. They’ve managed to convince everyone that it’s better to spend a gazillion dollars on “stuff” rather than to spend time with one another. In some cases, the only reason we get together is so we can exchange the “stuff-that-we-don’t-need-or-want”.

Go to lunch, go window shopping, get everyone together to cruise holiday decorations, happy hour…. Share a cup of coffee, cocoa, tea, (or in my case a glass of wine)…. Take an exercise class together, help each other wrap presents, bake cookies… Whatever… The point is…. Do something fun that will create a memory…. GIVE a little bit of yourself.

Giving your time is something that is much more meaningful and in my opinion much more valuable. Everyone is rushing around to shop for presents when what we really should be doing is spending time with one another. Ditch the gifts (unless they are white elephant … because seriously I love how creative some people get), and let’s just hang out and do something together. The pictures and selfies we take will for sure be memorialized forever on social media, and probably pop back up from time to time. It’s the gift that keeps giving especially if they are silly. 🙂

I consider myself lucky in that the people in my life like to “do stuff”…. like go to a concert, a movie or my favorite… do an exercise class and then go drinking afterwards. #WeWorkoutToDrink

Ok…. enough ranting…. I’d like to Thank my family and friends who take time out of their days to give their time to me. You know who you are… Seriously if I have to call you out, you aren’t paying attention. And if you want me to come over and help you bake while drinking wine or wrap presents while drinking wine (you see a trend, right?), Call Me!